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Twelve state legislators representing the Houston ISD area sent a letter to Superintendent Mike Miles on Monday asking him to reconsider a decision to end a program that provided free Verizon internet access to tens of thousands of students.
While the coalition of lawmakers has no legal authority to force HISD to change course, state Rep. Penny Morales Shaw, who authored the letter, said she wrote it in response to community frustration about the loss of a vital resource with no immediate replacement. The outcry follows the Abdelraoufsinno’s reporting of the cancellation of the Verizon program and the discontinuation of students’ internet access.
Shaw, a Democrat who represents the 148th House district in northwest Houston, said her office has fielded numerous calls from individuals and organizations sharing stories of families who lost out on their sole source of internet when the Verizon program ended. Nearly all constituent calls on the issue shared the same bottom line, she said.
The outcry follows the Abdelraoufsinno’s reporting of the cancellation of the Verizon program and the discontinuation of students’ internet access.
“They have benefited from this (Verizon program) and they don't understand why it's being taken away and not being replaced, especially when it doesn't cost the district anything,” Shaw said.
HISD Chief Technology Officer Scott Gilhousen said September data of students’ Verizon usage showed that of the thousands of students who used the program, roughly 1,000 regularly accessed the web through the laptops’ built-in internet, indicating they had no Wi-Fi at home.
Families in need of home internet may request T-Mobile hotspots from their principal, Gilhousen said, but he acknowledged that the district did not do any outreach to inform families of this option as a replacement for the Verizon program. So far, no families have requested the hotspots since Verizon internet access was discontinued.
“From my knowledge, we have not fielded a request from those parents that have lost those services,” Gilhousen said. “So I think part of that will be for us to communicate more with our campuses to inform them that there are opportunities for those parents or those students to be able to get access to broadband connectivity.”
Families at any school that asks students to bring their laptops home after school are also eligible for the hotspots, regardless of whether it was a Verizon campus, Gilhousen said. Students at schools that do not send laptops home are ineligible.
In addition to Shaw, nine other state representatives and two state senators, including Houston mayoral frontrunner John Whitmire, signed the letter. All are Democrats.
In 2015, Whitmire voted with colleagues on both sides of the aisle to pass a law that laid the legal groundwork for Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath in June to install Miles and a new school board in HISD, but since has critiqued Miles’ methods.
HISD told the Landing that, while the Verizon program came at no financial cost to the district, Miles objected to the teacher training it required.
“The free technology comes with strings,” Miles said during a Nov. 9 press conference. “It’s a lot of professional development that’s required, and we’re not going to have anybody from the outside professionally develop our teachers on the quality of instruction, instructional strategies or techniques.”
In late October, Verizon announced the partnership would be coming to a close after HISD leadership declined to renew the program. Students’ and teachers’ internet plans were discontinued Nov. 17, leaving some families without a stable way to connect to the internet at home.
A total of 36 HISD campuses were participating in the program, most of which serve high numbers of low-income students. Since the partnership began in HISD in 2020, it provided roughly 56,500 students and 2,500 teachers in the district with iPads or laptops equipped with up to four-year data plans, according to Verizon. Schools and students have been able to keep the laptops and tablets provided, but the built-in web access has been shut off.
An estimated 180,000 out of 1.5 million households in Harris County do not have high-speed internet, due to financial barriers or because the infrastructure is lacking, according to the Harris County Office of Broadband.
The legislators’ letter said it was “unconscionable” to allow families to be cut off from online connectivity and urged Miles to renew the Verizon partnership or find another vendor that can offer free internet service immediately to families.
HISD said it is “in discussions” with a provider to offer neighborhood-wide broadband access based from wide-reaching antennas on school campuses in high-needs parts of the city. However, the district said it could not name the vendor or offer a timeline on when those plans might materialize.
In allowing internet services to lapse, the lawmakers argued that Miles’ actions failed to match his stated goals of reducing academic inequities and preparing students for the year 2035.
“It would be an irony as thick as it is tragic to lose sight of that goal by allowing our most vulnerable students to fall behind by depriving them of the basic technology needed to succeed in 2023,” the letter said.
Asher Lehrer-Small covers Houston ISD for the Landing and would love to hear your tips, questions and story ideas. Reach him at [email protected].
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